Chapter 3 – Positioning Services in Competitive Markets
Chapter 3 – Positioning Services in Competitive Markets
Achieve Competitive Advantage through Focus * Basic Focus Strategies for Services [Figure 3.1] * Fully Focused – Limited range of services to a narrow and specific market segment. Developing recognized expertise in a well-defined niche may provide protection against would-be competitors and allows a firm to charge premium prices * Market Focused – Concentrates on a narrow market segment, but has a wide range of services * Service Focused – Offers a narrow range of services to a fairly broad market; firms need to develop knowledge and skills in serving each segment * Unfocused – Broad markets and provide a wide range of services; “Jacks of all trades and masters of none”
Market Segmentations Forms the Basis for Focused Strategies * Service firms vary widely in their abilities to serve different types of customers * Identifying and Selecting Target Segments * Market segment is composed of a group of buyers who share common characteristics, needs, purchasing behavior, or consumption patterns; as much similarly as possible but dissimilarity on those same characteristics between segments * Target segment is one that a firm has selected from among those in the broader market and may be defined on the basis of several variables * Marketers should select not only on the basis of their sales and profit potential, but also with reference to the firm’s ability to match or exceed competing offers, directed to the same segment
Service Attributes and Levels * Identify which attributes of a given service are important to specific segments and how well prospective customers perceive competing organizations as performing against these attributes * Important versus Determinant Attributes * Consumers usually make their choices among alternative service offerings on the basis of perceived differences between them; attributes that
Achieve Competitive Advantage through Focus * Basic Focus Strategies for Services [Figure 3.1] * Fully Focused – Limited range of services to a narrow and specific market segment. Developing recognized expertise in a well-defined niche may provide protection against would-be competitors and allows a firm to charge premium prices * Market Focused – Concentrates on a narrow market segment, but has a wide range of services * Service Focused – Offers a narrow range of services to a fairly broad market; firms need to develop knowledge and skills in serving each segment * Unfocused – Broad markets and provide a wide range of services; “Jacks of all trades and masters of none”
Market Segmentations Forms the Basis for Focused Strategies * Service firms vary widely in their abilities to serve different types of customers * Identifying and Selecting Target Segments * Market segment is composed of a group of buyers who share common characteristics, needs, purchasing behavior, or consumption patterns; as much similarly as possible but dissimilarity on those same characteristics between segments * Target segment is one that a firm has selected from among those in the broader market and may be defined on the basis of several variables * Marketers should select not only on the basis of their sales and profit potential, but also with reference to the firm’s ability to match or exceed competing offers, directed to the same segment
Service Attributes and Levels * Identify which attributes of a given service are important to specific segments and how well prospective customers perceive competing organizations as performing against these attributes * Important versus Determinant Attributes * Consumers usually make their choices among alternative service offerings on the basis of perceived differences between them; attributes that